Entertainment

Ms. Angelou does much more than spin a yarn about the early years of her life. Great suffering and terrible injustice is elevated to the highest level of art and beauty. Ms. Angelou’s voice, so pure and so clear, feels stylistically as a story told in the oral tradition and not a mere book.

I am still gripped by Fintan O’Toole’s powerful rendering of the Irish—a culture that is as mystical as it is exasperating. His ability to insert poignant memories from his own life within the context of the larger whole of modern Irish history gives the book far richer meaning than if he only presented historical narrative without his own personal reflection.